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Jones: Perdue's health-insurance proposal will take some selling

Gov. Sonny Perdue faces a tough sales job in winning support in the General Assembly for his proposal to help some small-business employees pay for health insurance.

He drew immediate praise from business advocates when he disclosed the outline of his plan Aug. 7. Representatives of the Georgia Chamber of Commerce and the National Federation of Independent Business joined him in a press conference and hailed the idea.

But members of the governor's own Republican Party have been grumbling since.

The idea is to combine $20 million in state funds with federal money expected to be left over from Medicaid efficiencies and to subsidize the health premiums of small businesses with middle- and low-income workers. His office figures 30,000 of the 380,000 uninsured small-business workers could be covered.

The income maximum would be $62,000 for a family of four or $30,000 for a single person.

Perdue's concept won an endorsement recently from "the father of health savings accounts," John Goodman, president of the National Center for Policy Analysis, a Dallas think tank that stresses free-market solutions to problems. In fact, health savings accounts would be one option participating employers could offer in addition to a Cadillac option that mirrors the benefits state workers get.

Goodman was in Atlanta last week offering his sweeping health-care solutions to a luncheon hosted by the Georgia Public Policy Foundation, where party leaders and legislators privately pooh-poohed Perdue's proposal. Goodman prescribes mechanisms that would spur health providers to compete on price and service and would require patients to make hard choices between the price of treatment and other uses of the money. But when asked afterward about Perdue's plan, he gave it his blessings.

However, about two hours later, House Speaker Glenn Richardson tossed a little barb.

During a press conference about Richardson's recommendation to expand vocational education, the Hiram Republican was asked what his legislation would cost. His reply of $20 million was an unmistakable dig at the governor, a replay of last winter when House Republicans passed a tax break for homeowners that just happened to be for exactly the same amount as a tax cut for senior citizens championed by Perdue.

Legislators were angry then about what they considered Perdue's meddling in their business and subsequently his nearly complete detachment. Today, they're miffed that, they say, he didn't seek their advice or even give them much of a preview of the health plan.

But they and other Republicans cite less personal reasons, too, for their chilly response.

First, they prefer tax credits to subsidies, arguing that credits don't mandate coverage plans or create entitlements. Making people legally entitled to certain benefits opens the door to unmanageable spending, they warn, like Social Security and Medicaid.

Second, they're still stinging from the near-collapse of PeachCare when it appeared early this year that the federal government might not renew its funding commitment to that health coverage program for poor children. They say they're not eager to depend on the feds again, knowing Georgia taxpayers would have to pay if Congress backed out.

After all, there's no guarantee the projected Medicaid savings will materialize anyway, considering the extent of medical inflation.

Third, Republicans' biggest objection is that they fear small businesses will drop their insurance to participate in the subsidized version, thereby driving up the taxpayers' costs.

Perdue included some safeguards against that, such as prohibiting anyone who could get coverage under a spouse's plan or another government plan, or anyone who has been covered within the last six months.

No legislators have said publicly that Perdue's plan is doomed. But they have privately questioned his allegiance to Republican principles.

Nevertheless, Perdue's proposal has shaken up the normally sleepy summer with an idea that will join tax reform, highway funding and trauma care in making the next legislative session a doozy. Early indications, though, suggest he'll need plenty of business allies helping him push it through the crowded legislative agenda if the lawmakers don't become any more enthusiastic by then.

 Walter Jones is the bureau chief for the Morris News Service and has been covering state politics since 1998. He can be reached at walter.jones@morris.com or (404) 589-8424.